Let's all welcome Sam Deduno back to the big leagues. Even if this if probably one of only one or two starts he'll ever make for the team, I'm interested. For the most part, this is because he's not at all a typical Minnesota Twins starter. Through his minor league career, he's struck out lots of batters, walked lots of them, and not given up many home runs. I'm not expecting much, it'll just be interesting to see how another anti-contact pitcher works out.
Deduno's opponent will be Derek Holland. He's making his first start in a month or so. It's going to be sort of boring to look up much info on him, so just imagine a guy who strikes some people out, walks some folk, and gives up some home runs. There. Now you're either picturing Derek Holland, or pretty much any other major-league capable pitcher.
Hopefully Deduno's first major league start is a solid one, and the 'Sam Deduno' tag that I'm debuting today gets to be used for a while longer.
I was thinking about the general good vibes about this season's team. In April they were awful, managing a meager six wins. May was a big improvement, with the Twins tripling their win total. June was helped by Interleague and the Twins finished 13-12 for the month. Comparing through 82 games last year, the Twins are actually a game behind: 35-47 versus 36-46 from 2011. Last year, however, had The Suck(tm) of August and September: 7-21 and 6-20 for the final two months. With the team healthier this year, they might be able to avoid the free-fall and have a chance to lose fewer than 90 games.
Final home game before the All-Star break and the Twins have a good chance to win another series. Right now, they're right behind Seattle for getting out of the AL basement.
Next Wednesday, the Twins will have completed half of the season. One of the things I love about baseball is the sheer number of games. It's more fun when the number of losses stops climbing so quickly, but with so many games we can ignore all of the crappy games and have plenty of great ones to remember.
With so many games however, it soon becomes expected that there's a game tomorrow. We still have 87 games left, but the day that ends is in sight.
